Subscribe to Yellow Swordfish
OK – I’m coming out of the closet here. I suffer from chronic arachnophobia. I have several fears but only one phobia. OK two phobias but I’m not going to talk about the other one! But spiders drive me crazy.
Stupid really isn’t it? I don’t even live in a country where there are any that can actually harm me. But there it is – whatever the reason (and no-one seems to actually know) – spiders terrify me. And actually, of course, I’m not coming out of the closet as I wouldn’t have been in there in the first place.
Plus it’s all very embarrassing. In fact it’s very humiliating when there you are, quaking in your slippers, rooted to the spot, cold sweat breaking out and you have to be rescued by your young son who comes along with the glass and the postcard and approaches the damn thing as if it was his best friend. And when captured, holds the glass up and starts admiring whats creeping and dancing about inside. It’s instant role reversal.
I’ll tell you some things about us die-hard arachnophobics that are probably not apparent to non-sufferers, who often scoff and deride our stupidity. When I walk into a room that contains a spider, even if I can’t see it, I know that it is there waiting for me. And I know that spiders are all over the place but I am talking about one that is about to take me by surprise. Secondly, even when the hairs don’t stand up on the nape of the neck the first thing you do when you enter a room is scan it. You do it quickly and others probably wouldn’t even notice you doing it but you do a quick glance in all the corners and likely spider party spots.
But the worst bit is that you can’t be in the room with the spider and you can’t leave the room until you know it’s gone. And that’s the bit that really drives you crazy.
OK, you know… you can’t really call it closet arachnophobia when everyone already knows about it…
I’m the same. I’ve always had a fear of spiders, and ants weirdly, even though I’m fine with snakes and rats and pretty much everything else apart from heights.
A few years ago I trekked the Inca trail in Peru with my wife. We ended up after four day’s walking and camping in a frontier town Aguas Calientes, near Macchu Pichu. I remember standing with a well deserved beer in my hand, in the main square on the night of our arrival. We’d already had a relaxing bath in the thermal mud pool higher up the town and we were both feeling elated if a bit tired. All of a sudden a huge winged beetle landed on my shoulder. It was so big that I could feel it land.
To be all Welsh about it, I nearly shat myself.
And see… I’d have been OK anout the beetle. Big ones anyway…. Probably. But talking of heights…
I wonder if there is a correlation between short people (that’s me by the way – well 5 ft 7 3/4) and fear of heights. You’d think people closer to the ground would be less prone.
You beat me by about 2 inches! (Wash my mouth out!) Perhaps you’re right.
I have an odd thing with heights. Empire State Building, Eiffel Tower etc., all no problem. I can wander on the top and look down with no ill-effect. A couple of weeks back I went up the CN Tower in Toronto. No problem on the observation deck. But then I went to the ‘glass floor’ on which you can stand and look straight down to the streets below – a sheer drop! And that freaked me